


Wounds

by SirPrize



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: ...Depending on how you look at vampires, Angst, Canon Lesbian Relationship, Carmilla Movie, Carmilla is only briefly dead, F/F, Hollstein - Freeform, I promise, Revamping, Weep for me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-03
Updated: 2017-12-03
Packaged: 2019-02-10 02:28:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12902013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SirPrize/pseuds/SirPrize
Summary: Arguments are cuts.Breaking up is a blow.Watching Carmilla’s limp body drop to the floor? Realizing her heart isn’t beating?The tear that leaves feels like you are being split in half. As if the piece of Carmilla that was taken was tied to something in you and it is now violently being torn loose.





	Wounds

**Author's Note:**

> So Creampuffs, how are you all today?
> 
> I'm here to harvest tears. Please all take a bucket and line up to be punching in the soul. No pushing.
> 
> But seriously, though I maintain that the movie was alright but deeply flawed, this scene kind of stuck with me so I finally got around to writing something based on it. Besides, I hadn't written anything nice and angsty in quite a while, so here ya go.
> 
> Let me know what you think, Creampuffs!

What do you do when you lose someone you love?

What do you do when they are torn from your life so completely that nothing, not dark magic or wishes or herculean effort can bring them back?

And torn really is the right word, isn’t it? Because when people are taken like that, it’s not a cut. It’s not a clean wound that hurts and bleeds and bleeds. A cut is simple. Straight edges, smooth lines. Quick and easily made. The hurt might linger, but they heal quickly.

A cut is an argument. A cut is frustration piling upon frustration until there’s nothing but resentment and the only options are a screaming match or avoidance, both painful in their own delightful ways. A cut is harsh words soothed over by reconciliation and tearful apologies.

A cut is arguing with Carmilla, trying to drag her on to your side while you deal with Mattie and not understanding why she wasn’t there already.

Healing from one is coming to understand it. To understand Carmilla. To understand your own limitations and where you both went wrong. Healing is apologizing and accepting and realizing that through all of it you never could fall out of love with her.

That’s a cut.

Losing someone so irreversibly can’t be called a blow either. A blow is dull. Hard, but not as quick or simple as a cut. A blow can put a hole straight through you which takes so, so long to heal. It hurts and it bleeds much like a cut. Fitting, since like a cut, a blow is inevitably delivered by someone you care about.

Cuts come quickly, though. Cuts are someone lashing out and leaving a lot of wounds in a fit of anger or frustration. A blow is so much slower and the pain is all the worse for it. Cuts can be plenty precise, but a blow is thought out. The person who put that hole in you knew what would happen. They chose to hit you. They chose to do more damage in one blow than a hundred cuts could have. They chose to leave.

It was their choice to hurt you, even if dealing it might have hurt them too. That is what makes the hole it leaves less clean than a cut. The edges are ragged and it is clear for all to see that it was meant to do as much damage as possible.

Of course, holes can heal too. They heal slower than a cut, but they can heal. Whether it’s getting over someone, finding someone to help you heal or accepting that the pain you’re feeling now is only a shred of the pain you’d have condemned each other to later. Healing from a blow is slow and unpleasant and it will leave scars. Even in those rare instances where you find each other again, there will always be a scar.

Love is a long road to walk, and sometimes it takes a toll like that. It’s not so bad. Some people have more than others, but everyone has scars.

If arguments with Carmilla are cuts, breaking up with you is a blow.

The frustration, the lack of communication and the uncertainty all building to a breaking point. She ran from her problems, and you only pushed harder if the world tried to prove you wrong. Even back then some small part of you was worried about how badly it could go, but you weren’t prepared.

Few things have hit you quite as hard as watching Carmilla leave while your heart stopped, clenched and finally shattered. Getting stuck with her and Mattie in that stupid house while Vordenburg ruined everyone’s lives certainly didn’t help you heal the hole in your chest.

Healing was learning who you were. Learning what you’d done. Healing was coming to understand Carmilla through arguments and shouting and quiet, heavy conversations as the place where your heart had once been pulsed with longing. Healing was recognizing that the hole in Carmilla’s chest mirrored your own.

Healing was throwing away everything you thought you knew about yourself and the world and killing an old man to keep her safe. To keep her alive. It tore you open in new ways, but the hole in your chest finally began to heal as she ushered you away.

Healing was realizing that you two still, despite the holes you both carried in your chest, couldn’t fall out of love

That’s a blow.

Tears? Tears are far worse than blows or cuts.

A cut is precise, but quick. A blow is slow, but so much more damaging. Tears are accidental. They can still be the result of someone’s actions, but nobody intends to tear the people they love open. Nobody _wants_ to leave a wound like that and if they are around to see it, everyone is horrified that they did.

The problem is that they’re rarely around to see it.

Tears are sudden deaths. Tears are a life being wrenched away without the time for goodbyes, apologies or a last ‘I love you’. Nothing but regret and missed opportunities given shape in the form of a jagged, gushing wound which lays bare all that you are.

Or rather, all that you are without the person who was torn away.

Quick like a cut, but no less destructive than a blow. Tears are heart-wrenching despair and unbelievable agony. They bring even the strongest people to their knees, the pain too great for them to get up again.

And yet, even tears _can_ heal. However, it takes years or decades and sometimes they never do. The scars dwarf those of cuts or blows and are best hidden from most people. Tears are so easily reopened, even when they have healed.

This is news to neither you, nor Carmilla.

She lost Ell and her wound stayed open for so very long. She lost you, however briefly, and even that tear only seemed to heal whenever she could fall asleep with her ear pressed to your heart.

You lost your mother and while you healed quicker, you can still feel yourself split open every now and then.

Arguments are cuts.

Breaking up is a blow.

Watching Carmilla’s limp body drop to the floor? Realizing her heart isn’t beating?

The tear that leaves feels like you are being split in half. As if the piece of Carmilla that was taken was tied to something in you and it is now violently being torn loose.

She can’t be dead.

Those words echo over and over in your head like a sick chant as you look down at her unmoving body and the rest of the world falls away.

She can’t be dead. She can’t be dead. She can’t be dead.

You were happy. You were okay. Everything was okay. You were going to fix this and you were going to go home and resume your lives. The lives you earned, dammit! The life Carmilla earned!

You’ve survived anglerfish monsters and pagan gods and your own stupid arguments and insecurities. You saved the world. You love each other. Carmilla can’t be dead because you had _fucking_ earned this.

She can’t be dead she can’t be dead she can’t be dead she can’t be dead she can’t be dead.

No grumpy whine about how her head aches after it slammed against the floor. No crooked smile as she tries to calm you down. No questions as to what happened. No rise and fall of her chest. No pulse under the fingers pressed to already cooling skin.

No spark in those eyes.

She can’t she can’t she can’t she can’t she can’t she can’t she can’t!

The part of you that can still think wants to ask Lafontaine to do something, but God knows where they are. It wants to shout at Perry to work some sort of first aid magic, but you can’t save someone whose life was stolen with CPR. You want to chase after Ell, but you have no idea what happened so you can’t turn it back.

You’re holding your lifeless lover in your arms and you can’t fix this.

Can’t can’t can’t can’t can’t can’t can’t can’t.

You can’t breathe. You can’t think. Tears are clouding your vision and for just a second you wonder if this all-consuming panic is what Carmilla felt when your roles were reversed and she was the one holding you.

All you know is that you would give or do _anything_ to change things because you love her and you need her and _she can’t be dead!_

That agony? That sheer panic and despair that makes you want to scream until your throat bleeds? That’s a tear.

Thankfully, healing is simple this time. It comes in the form of fluttering eyelids and a single word.

“Hey.”

Carmilla’s voice is dazed and confused, but she’s alive! Alive!

“Hey.” The word feels like weight on your tongue, but it tastes like relief.

The fact that she’s still cold and her heart doesn’t beat as you embrace her makes your own sink, but the sound you make through your tears and gasping breaths is joyful because she’s not dead. Carmilla is here in your arms and she is alive…as much as a vampire can be at least.

It’s not great. In fact it’s downright awful and it disrupts every plan you guys have made for the next few years, but it’s enough. She’s talking . She’s sitting up and hugging you back. She’s not dead. She’s not dead and this can be fixed.

You can take back the life you two have earned and, even if you have to find a way to punch a ghost, you two _will_ grow old together.

You’ll find a way. There is always a way.

**Author's Note:**

> So if you'll just deposit the buckets by the door on your way out I can start bathing in your tears to regain my dark powers. Or season my soup with them, either one.
> 
> Anyway, what did you think, Creampuffs? Whenever I write something like this I always seem to ramble (with varying levels of pretentiousness), but I suppose since it primarily deals with Laura's emotions, a bit of rambling is hardly misplaced.
> 
> Anyway, got the angst out of my system for a while so back to work on the next chapter of Dating Theory, which...okay, so that also starts out a dit depressing, but I promise that gets way better before the chapter's over.


End file.
